H.L. Mencken [1880-1956] Page at Spirit of America Bookstore

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H.L. Mencken

H.L. Mencken was a journalist, satirist, critic, and a cynic and freethinker
known as the "Sage of Baltimore" and the "Voltaire of his time".

Henry Louis Mencken was born in Baltimore, Maryland on 12 September 1880. He was a reporter for the Baltimore Morning Herald from 1899 until 1906, when he moved to the Baltimore Sun. He developed a wide-ranging reputation also writing fiction, non-fiction & poetry, and began writing essays for The Smart Set Magazine from 1908. In 1924, he and George Jean Nathan co-founded The American Mercury Magazine (edited by Mencken & published by Alfred A. Knopf); the magazine endured until 1981. Mencken was a mentor to many reporters and authors over the years, including John Fante [1909-83] and Alistair Cooke.

Mencken is considered a libertarian, an outspoken defender of Constitutional freedoms, and a fierce opponent of persecution, injustice, puritanism, and self-righteousness (while his views were sometimes tainted with racism, anti-Semitism, and 'elitism'). His literary & political wit was superb, and he is revered as a cynic & curmudgeon on a par with Mark Twain.

A cerebral thrombosis in 1948 left him aware and fully conscious but unable to read or write, effectively ending his literary career. He died on 29 January 1956 at the age of seventy-five.
He had suggested his epitaph earlier in The Smart Set, which was inscribed on a plaque in the lobby of The Baltimore Sun: "If, after I depart this vale, you ever remember me and have thought to please my ghost, forgive some sinner, and wink your eye at some homely girl."

Links About H.L. Mencken

Works About H.L. Mencken

"Inherit The Wind" feature film
[United Artists October 1960]
The E.K. Hornbeck reporter character was modelled on H.L. Mencken's real-life participation in the
Scopes vs. State of Kentucky 'monkey trial' of 1925, the first U.S. trial broadcast on national radio.

"Inherit The Wind" playscript [1955]
by Jerome Lawrence & Robert E. Lee
Ballantine mass pb [11/2003] for $6.99
Dramatists Play Service 8x5¼ pb [1/96] for $6.50
play credits at Internet Broadway Database

H.L. Mencken's columns on the Scopes trial

Directed by Stanley Kramer; script by Nedrick Young & Harold Jacob Smith, based on the 1955 play; starring Spencer Tracy, Fredric March, Gene Kelly, Dick York, Donna Anderson, Harry Morgan, Claude Akins, Noah Beery Jr. & Norman Fell; Oscar nominations for Best Adapted Script, Best Actor {Tracy}, Best Cinematography & Best Editing, BAFTA noms for Best Film & Best Actors (Tracy & March}
M.G.M. b&w DVD [11/2001] for $10.99
M.G.M. b&w VHS [2/97] out of stock/many used
full credits from IMDb

1965 NBC tv movie starring Melvyn Douglas & Ed Begley: full credits from IMDb
1988 NBC tv movie starring Kirk Douglas, Jason Robards & Darren McGavin: full credits from IMDb
1999 MGM/Showtime tv movie starring Jack Lemmon, George C. Scott & Beau Bridges: full credits from IMDb

Works By H.L. Mencken

Book & tape sales in association with

	"Mencken: The American Iconoclast - The Life & Times of The Bad Boy of Baltimore" [2005] by Marion Elizabeth Rodgers Oxford Univ Press 8¾x5¾ pb [8/2007] for $25.00 Oxford Univ Press 9¼x6¾ hardcover [11/2005] for $11.85
	"The Skeptic: A Life of H.L. Mencken" [2002] by Terry Teachout Harper Perennial 8x5¼ pb [11/2003] for $10.85 HarperCollins 8¾x7 hardcover [11/2002] out of print/used
	"Our Man In Washington" [2000] by Roy Hoopes A mystery novel by Cain biographer Hoopes, about real-life pals James M. Cain and journalist H.L. Mencken in the 1920s. Forge pb [10/2001] out of print/used Forge hardcover [9/2000] out of print/used
	"Mencken: A Life" [1994] by Fred Hobson Johns Hopkins Univ Press 9½x6¼ pb [11/95] for $22.95 Random House 9½x6¾ hardcover [5/94] out of print/used
	"The H.L. Mencken Murder Case" [1988] by Don Swaim When a bookstore employee is murdered, apparently over an 18th Century manuscript, the reclusive bookstore owner brings his father's friend 'Harry' into helping prevent further mayhem. {circa 1948} St. Martin hardcover [10/88] out of print/used
	"The Constant Circle: H. L. Mencken & His Friends" [1968] by Sara Mayfield Fire Ant 9½x5½ pb [7/2003] for $25.00 Delacorte hardcover [1/68] out of print/used
	"John Fante and H.L. Mencken: A Personal Correspondence, 1930-1952" [1989] Edited by Michael Moreau & Joyce Fante Black Sparrow Press pb [1/89] out of print/used Black Sparrow hardcover [8/89] out of print/used
	"H.L. Mencken" [1924 biography] by Ernest Boyd Cosimo Classics 7¾x4¾ pb [10/2006] for $15.95 Kessinger 9x6 hardcover [7/2007] for $26.56

	"A Religious Orgy In Tennessee: A Reporter's Account of The Scopes Monkey Trial" [2006] by H.L. Mencken Melville House Publng 7½x5½ pb [9/2006] for $16.95
	"Mencken's America" [2004] Edited by S.T. Joshi Ohio Univ Press 8¾x6 pb [2/2004] for $22.95 Ohio Univ Press 9¼x6½ hardcover [2/2004] for $40.40
	"Thirty-Five Years of Newspaper Work: A Memoir" [1994] Edited by Fred Hobson, Vincent Fitzpatrick & Bradford Jacobs Johns Hopkins Univ Press pb [9/2006] for $25.00 Johns Hopkins Univ Press 9x6 pb [1/96] for $16.95 Johns Hopkins Univ Press 9½x6½ hardcover [8/94] out of print/used
	"My Life As Author and Editor" [1993] Edited by Jonathan Yardley Vintage 8½x5½ pb [1/95] for $25.00 Knopf 9½x6½ hardcover [1/93] for $30.00

	"The Vintage Mencken" [1955] Gathered by Alistair Cooke Vintage 8¼x5½ pb [3/90] for $10.74 Vintage mass pb [8/55] out of print/used Vintage mass pb [8/55] out of print/used
	"A Mencken Chrestomathy: His Own Selection of His Choicest Writing" [1948] Vintage 7¾x5¼ pb [4/82] for $14.93 "A Second Mencken Chrestomathy" [1994] Edited by Terry Teachout Vintage 8x5 pb [9/95] out of print/used Knopf 8¾x6 hardcover [1/95] out of print/used
	"A New Dictionary of Quotations On Historical Principles From Ancient & Modern Sources" [1942] Selected & edited by H.L. Mencken Knopf 9½x7 hardcover [6/42] for $54.95
	H.L. Mencken's 3-volume autobiography "Happy Days, 1880�1892" [1940] Johns Hopkins Univ Press 8¾x5¾ pb [8/2006] for $25.00 "Newspaper Days, 1899�1906" [1941] Johns Hopkins Univ Press 8¾x5¾ pb [8/2006] for $25.00 "Heathen Days, 1890�1936" [1943] Johns Hopkins Univ Press 8¾x5¾ pb [8/2006] for $25.00
	"The American Language" [1919 classic] Knopf 9½x6¾ 4th edition hardcover [6/36] for $37.80

Spirit of America BookstoreH.L. Mencken

Spirit of America Bookstore
H.L. Mencken